


Legacy of a Corsair

by SherlockianDinosaur



Series: The Holmes Brothers are Perfect [2]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Drug Use, Gen, Junkylock, Kid Fic, Kid Mycroft, Kidlock, Minor Character Death, Mycroft has a cat, Teenlock, and some angsties, only a little though, some fluffies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-23
Updated: 2014-01-23
Packaged: 2018-01-09 17:37:17
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,123
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1148906
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SherlockianDinosaur/pseuds/SherlockianDinosaur
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock was taught from a young age of the dangers of sentiment and the disadvantages of caring, but Redbeard remains the exception to the rule.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Legacy of a Corsair

_“Nobody knows exactly where the real Redbeard’s from. Greece, or Albania or somewhere near there, not important. He was… Well, there were two of him, technically. Brothers.”_

 

“Cats are stupid,” Sherlock announced from where he’d flopped face-first onto the sofa. “They don’t _do_ anything.”

Mycroft didn’t look up from his notebook, pen only pausing an instant as he remembered Mummy in the next room preparing supper. It would be best to keep at least some of the bite from his remarks. “If you’re comparing them to dogs, which I’m quite certain you are, I don’t think you fully grasp the concept of stupidity.”

There was a pause before Sherlock rolled over to look at where Mycroft was seated at the table. The elder brother’s school clothes remained pristine despite a full day of wear. Ginger tinged hair still fell and curled where it was supposed to, only his shoes showing signs of wear in the form of mud spray from the wet streets. From where he lay Sherlock couldn’t see his brother’s scrawl across the page, but he knew it well enough to criticise it’s perfection as well.

Napoleon watched Mycroft as well. The brown tabby lay on her white stomach beside the elder brother’s notebook, ready to pounce on the swift movement of his pen. Her tail flicked arrhythmically where it hung off the table. Sherlock rolled his eyes.

“She’s boring.”

With a sigh, Mycroft set down his pen. “She’s clever.”

“Obviously not, you can’t even train her.”

“She uses the litter box, does she not? She’s too smart to bother listening. Why should she?” Mycroft watched his two-year-old tabby as she kept her eyes on the pen. “Dogs don’t even have enough mental capacity to do anything other than listen. They simply want to please their masters and what good is that?”

“As much good as doing your homework,” Sherlock quipped, rolling from the couch and dragging himself towards the kitchen.

Napoleon, bored now that the pen had stopped, got to her feet and leapt from the table.

  


_“The older brother Aruj was given dozens of galleys and captured ships left and right when he was working as a corsair. During the siege in Minorca he took more than twenty in a month. That was_ after _he’d lost his left arm.”_

  


Mycroft lay on his back, a book held in front of his face and a three-year-old Napoleon curled on his stomach. His right hand scratched absently behind the tabby’s ear.

“Redbeard,” Sherlock said from the doorway.

Mycroft’s scratching stopped as he looked to his brother. “The pirate?”

“The dog.”

Napoleon protested the pause in attention by crawling up to Mycroft’s chest, knocking the book aside. The elder brother’s fingers were soon back on her neck, though his brow creased at his curly-haired brother stepped more fully into the room. “Whose dog?”

“Ours, obviously. That’s what I’m naming him.”

Mycroft propped himself up on his elbows, Napoleon falling gracefully from his chest onto the mattress beside him. The elder brother feared for the conversation that was about to occur, but arched a brow in silent askance.

Sherlock was overwhelmed with smug excitement that he only bothered toning down for the sake of irritating his brother. “Well if you haven’t worked it out…”

“Sherlock.”

“Really, it’s hardly fair to tell you, it’s so obvious-”

“What are you talking about? _Tell me_.”

The younger brother was slipping into a grin he thought he was containing. “If only you would just _look_ , maybe you could-”

“I’ll tell Mummy what happened to her typewriter.”

Sherlock froze, eyeing his brother. “Uncle Richard’s dog is having puppies.”

Napoleon was climbing back onto the elder Holmes, but he hardly seemed to notice. “And Dad thought-”

“Yeah.”

“But Mummy-”

“No.”

“I see,” Mycroft drawled, not doing anything to hide his distaste. He dropped again onto his back, picking up his book as Napoleon reclaimed her throne. “When does the horror begin?”

“Mummy says four weeks.”

With a hum, Mycroft’s mouth twisted into a frown.

  


_“He went all over Spain and Italy and the Grecian Islands with his brother and declared himself Sultan of Algiers for a while because no one could do anything about it. He did whatever he wanted until they sent their army after him.”_

  


“Stay.”

The growing Irish Setter shifted from paw-to-paw where he sat, dark eyes trained on the grinning seven-year-old who was inching backwards until he hit the opposite wall.

“Stay…” Sherlock warned again as he moved to the doorway, holding eye contact with Redbeard until he rounded the corner and disappeared out of sight.

Mycroft watched on from the sofa, Napoleon and her casted paw seated beside him. Even seeking the comfort of her injury she gave the impression she was lowering herself by deigning to join them. With a straight face, Mycroft eyed the Setter, pretending he wasn’t quite so impressed with Sherlock’s success..

“Redbeard!”

The Setter flinched but remained seated, eyes moving to the elder brother.

Mycroft arched a brow. “Well? Go on, then.”

Claws were immediately scrabbling for purchase on the wooden floors as Redbeard bounded toward the doorway where Sherlock had disappeared. Mycroft’s lips pulled up at the shrieked laughter that followed and the thud and patter of paws that could only have been Sherlock letting the dog tackle him to the ground.

  


_“Redbeard had to join the Ottoman Empire to escape the Spanish. Can’t imagine he fancied that, didn’t seem to help him anyway. They kept sending armies at him. Even outnumbered nearly two to one his army last twenty days before he was killed.”_

  


Sherlock ran up the stairs the second he was given the chance. Past the toilets where he caught a glimpse of his blood and dirt smeared face; past Mycroft’s room where university bags had only just been unpacked; he closed himself inside the familiar clutter of his bedroom

Sitting with his back against the door, Sherlock let out a heavy sigh. It was the first breath he felt like he’d actually managed in hours; the air downstairs between his father’s reprimanding words had been far too thick. The tension was practically seeping through the crack beneath the door and Sherlock shut his eyes, let his head fall against the grained wood.

Footfalls could soon be hard in the hall. They were unmistakably Mycroftian and Sherlock reached a hand up to turn the lock.

“Sherlock?”

Four-year-old Redbeard’s claws clicked on the wood floors as Mycroft knocked, his cheerful prance, slow and cautious. Sherlock felt the push on the door as he tried to nose his way in.

“Sherlock, has something happened?”

Sherlock heard Mycroft trying the handle. His face turned to a sneer. “I know you could hear them, don’t bother to ask if you already know the answer.”

He didn’t have to see Mycroft’s tiny smirk to know it was there. Redbeard’s collar hit the floor, his nose sniffing beneath the door, vast inches from Sherlock’s hand. Napoleon jumped down from from Sherlock’s desk to slink away under the younger brother’s bed.

“Did you get hurt?”

“Not as much as he did.”

Redbeard shifted, and whined, nose trying to get to Sherlock’s other hand as Mycroft leaned against the door.

The elder brother searched the wood grain as if it might give him answers. “People tend to react poorly when you know their secrets.”

“I don’t care about _people._ ” Picking his head up, Sherlock glanced at the doorknob. Care or not, the situation was terribly inconvenient.

There was a long pause before Mycroft dared to ask. “Are you going to let me in?”

Sherlock didn’t answer. In the silence Redbeard reached beneath the door with tongue and paw and Sherlock stuck a finger under to meet him halfway. “No.”

  


_“His brother took his name after he died. Took back the city and went on looting and raiding for thirty years. Except he seemed a bit tied to legalities. Bit dull for a corsair, really.”_

  


Sherlock could hear Redbeard whining before he even made it up the path to the front door. A glance at the extra cars on on the street put a crease in his brow. Sherlock tried to remember how he’d lost a day, for it certainly didn’t seem like Christmas yet.

His breathing was heavy and uneven as he stumbled towards the door, pushing the bell with a shaking hand. Redbeard barked on the other side of the door.

“Shhh. Redbeard, hush… Hush.” The words were mumbled through scattered breathing. “Hush, Redbeard,” he tried again and the dog quieted, pulling a tiny smile over Sherlock’s lips.

Inside he could hear the shuffling of feet and chairs. The door pulled open and Sherlock met his brother’s eyes in open panic.

“Sherlock… Oh no, Sherlock.” Mycroft reached towards his brother, finding him hot to the touch, face sweating even in the December cold. Ten-year-old Redbeard jumped up on achy hind legs and Mycroft tried to hold him off with his free hand.

“Down, boy,” the younger brother muttered, very nearly shoving his brother aside in an attempt to get into the house.

Already he could hear the visiting family coming in from the kitchen, gasping at his condition. Sherlock sneered in their direction as Mycroft pulled him back out the door.

“Hospital, Sherlock.” There was no arguing with Mycroft’s tone but Sherlock tried anyway, desperately pushing into the house.

“Home, Mycroft. I need to go home. Home. Home.”

“Get in the car, _now._ ”

Sherlock pulled away from his brother’s grip, nausea rising in his throat for the third time in half an hour. Mycroft managed to pull the front door closed before anything came of Sherlock’s retching. It was obvious most of his stomach had already emptied elsewhere.

Pulling Sherlock into his side, Mycroft dragged him towards their mother’s car with Redbeard at his heels.

  


“They were practically the only reason the Ottoman Empire had any worth at all, but Mycroft’s always got some idea about political agenda.” Sherlock rolled his eyes, running fingertips through the soft red hair on the dying Setter’s ears.

Redbeard’s stare fixed on Sherlock, head not lifting from where it rest on his stomach. Swallowing thickly, the younger Holmes wished he’d told the story more slowly so he’d still have something to say. Instead he shifted so only his shoulders were propped against his headboard, Redbeard’s head cradled against Sherlock’s chest. He wrapped one arm around the Setter’s ribcage, the thump of an aged heart beat against a track-marked forearm. Part of Sherlock counted the remaining cadence of Redbeard’s life.

“He didn’t even have red hair,” he murmured, watching rust-coloured fur slid through his fingers.

Redbeard took a deep breath, dark brown eyes still glued to Sherlock’s face. His gaze was heavy with the knowledge of the end and Sherlock looked for fear but found none, only complete faith and undying gratitude.

Sherlock didn’t dare let go long enough to wipe the tears from his face.

His door opened, Mycroft just visible out of the corner of the younger brother’s eye.

“Don’t you _dare_ say what you’re thinking.” Sherlock still didn’t look up. Still didn’t dry his face.

Mycroft pursed his lips to hide his loss of apathy. “I don’t have to,” he murmured in short response. He took a seat beside them on the edge of Sherlock’s bed, one gentle hand on the Setter’s hip. He was almost surprised when his younger brother didn’t protest.

They were quiet for a long time, putting off their final battle.

“Sherlock.”

The younger brother shook his head, some part of him panicking with what was about to come. He anchored himself in Redbeard’s deep eyes.

“Memorise him, Sherlock.”

Tears rose again and he took a moment to swallow them before sitting up. The Setter tried twice before he managed to follow suit. Eye to eye, Sherlock ran both hands over Redbeard’s head, scratching underneath his collar, down his back. A pained nostalgic smile pulled over Sherlock’s face as the Setter melted into the touch. “That’s a good boy, Redbeard.” He dropped his forehead against Redbeard’s, meeting the familiar scent of rain and oak and warmth with silent unconscious _thank you_ ’s.

Finally Sherlock took a breath.

“Ready?”

Suspense stilled Napoleon in the doorway.

Sherlock pulled away. Redbeard held his stare.

“Yeah,” Sherlock muttered. “I’m ready.”

  
  
  
  
  


When Sherlock shuts his eyes and calls for the Setter, he hears the sound of claws scurrying along the wooden floors of his childhood. Together they fall to the floor and play hide-and-seek in the halls of his mind palace, laying waste to the caverns of retained knowledge in favour of trivial memories. Redbeard stays when he’s told and comes when he’s called and never dares look at Sherlock with anything but fatal affection.

 


End file.
